Screening and impurity ionization energy in semiconductors

Abstract

Usually microscopic electrostatic field around charged impurity ions is neglected when the ionization energy is concerned. The ionization energy is considered to be equal to that of a lonely impurity atom. Here the energy of the electrostatic field around charged impurity ions in semiconductor is taken into account. It is shown that the energy of this field contributes to decrease in the effective ionization energy. At high enough current carriers concentration the effective ionization energy becomes zero.